WESTLAND.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LI, Issue 5604, 10 February 1879, Page 6

WESTLAND.

FIBOH OTTB OW3 COEBB3PO2TDE>T.] L Fbb. 3. I sent you a telegram last week about the new rush to Lake Mahanipua. The communication with Christchurch is so slow and uncertain that X had no means of know® what telegrams might have been sent fc® other quarters, and there is generally scdi disposition to exaggerate about new that I thought it best to send a few lines. The new rush is situated on the shores oi a small lake, about seven or eight miles as W crow flies—if there are any crows in the Colony— from Hokitika. One way to reach it is by boat, another is by the coach from Hokitika to Boss, as far as Ogilvie’s, whew yon have to take a boat down a small creeii which brings yon into the lake. The latter was the rente pursued by your correspondent and certainly for picturesque beauty nothing can surpass the journey. .After leaving Hokitika and crossing the river by the punt*" an abominable institution by the wav, an which will soon be superseded by the new bridge now building—the road lies first throng the Kanieri diggings, and then through t bush. There are very few clearings nnu» Ogilvie’a accommodation house is reache , bat tiie West Coast bush is particular J beautiful at this time of the year,froin abundance of rata in bloom. The utt. voyage down the creek is through uncJeaw bosh, the trees growing not only down to water’s edge, hut even in the water. Two three have fallen across the stream, and m these, masses of parasites and ferns, to most beautiful (but slightly ineonveme 1 natural bridges. However, as nobody crosses them, they are more objects gratify one’s (esthetic tastes, than of ffl practical utility. They require care m use of the sculls, or—but I will no. tempted to make the very obvious pun suggests itself. Through the devious ingsof the creek, we Sowlymake our .« until it opens into the lake, and tne lovely scene presents itself. Th® “f n about two miles broad by three long, with forest trees, buried in fact in the b •' except on the southern shore, where - partial clearances have been made, t cflstanoe are the snow-capped.Soiithorn i dividing us alas! from happy <^ ter S On a fine day, such as we bad, .the - could hardly be surpassed. , We landed on a small, sandy be*e“' 0 { } speedily found ourselves on the onm newly opened paddock. The sod JL, sandofadarkoSour,and exacUyresemg the sand on the ocean beach of tn o Coast. The wash-dirt lies from T* to 'j, below the surface of the in covered by extremely dense bush. * L# the tropics, I have never seen sue bush as here on the West Coastcatch a glimpse of the earth mm° jjj but hero you can see nothing ' V root*. . These, however, as the very large, do not present anyg«»* or v wb» to we experienced miners wesaw at w were sdl middle-aged or elderly m • were notjvery enthusiastic, and one laid he “didn’t see what there was i v about. It was good enough for a owns to who hadn’t anythmg toM M ho WUet, but it wasn’t good enoug anything for.” This seemed tet» genaral opinion. sbovm fort ytwo poqtipg claim out of which m g t pet ounces of gold were °btamed, ro twenty felt by ton. and it different from the others. 0 d cs kind enough to wash out shovel. The gold is about as J^ oul d ,e*J and newly all f going over the sides of the ot && , m washing up the miners use p and amalgamated copperplate -. # e Altogether there was very y learn, L the miners were very p^ seem ip the leastto f^. o^ 8 jnoet ing enriosity. What struck m

Hired 6T®n in Ssssoie‘A s* -$£ rf -rjo- ?' rfjout Bre or .1* du up , putm !o r„oul<i !,aTe S.wav to suchifl (ret and not tend to force it' ffe! £ rt „ f ;,m Then seerof {he Td to l» pumped out, ■ th S of * a * r i’illun/irwhed. « d tain 9 8 ? jjrt raised * nd when four or them one hundred th flrC3 “„ divide al ’ long ßut gUO h i* the fas«* 411 ■ and charm °‘ ", wno doubt ?in Which the i bngth of 25 *» be taken up. looking rerr bad «n the limes a! t which was thought to DO., SfSK^ISSJ'KE' tU -S pro*!*"* of a digpnj JthuStoCk it up « bnel i* l . na ughtT French StS%ifA , SyFSS- * W Westland you ?“ n “ k the story I aUudetoSU th e characters of the Old and sneeringly described 0°? °* 'Liotrt hrmoyant, par exempt* 9** w i- t T atn ioajoan larmoyant, but US this letter with weeping, The awful wwiS on thi.W«fc wh**f* "L h to make one despair of the Cosst »SSi*,. u it a faihms or is it in the days of Queen Elizabeth *s i 1 ™ 2 ? nM'fflsrr ? I received on Feb. 1 a cf We Plymouth on July 20. It'JZ isr arrived Wellington papers of Sf an unusually quit*»Hage. 7 Li to ten days being toe usual tame fo"L*. I kiter to reach Hokitika from Wel£t know when the Canterbury tei bu t it only amvea here on ** f"*'*

wretched little tubs the West insets, they come when they hkeand r r ,hen tbev like ; sometimes they put V&rortvou want to go to. and somedon’t They charge £4 from NelZv, Hindis, and for every morsel of lugZ ore: the regulation allowance at the rate SWoa, and vou take your chance of .mashed on the tar, battened down in . rtTcabm hie rats in a trap. All this is beprivate interests are oppwed to the rabli: convenience- It is admitted that there Uoriv one place on this coast where anything life a’decent port can be made, and that is at Westport, the money that has been nstedv Hokitika had been spent on immoral Westport, and good roads and bridges iailown the coast from Westport, that *on!d hue been the only place of call for sit bat snail local steamers. Bat no; political and mercantile interests bad connected themselves with HokT (I never have patience to write list name in full; it always reminds me of the Eng of the Cannibal Islands, who ste his potatoes “ steeped in brandy, boiled in ron”), and Hold’ is, and must remain, notTfithfiandinf its desolate and decayed condition, the chief port on the West Coast What is the consequence P About four days oat of five steamers of any decent size cannot get meanest get out, the bar is always shifiinr. and the wretched inhabitants are left without news, and often without food, and what we do get is preposterously dear. We are paring in the township, when inside, 2Q« a nrt for potatoes, eighteenpence a pound hTEostimdi of fruit, and everything else in proportion. And the worst of it is, that we « all « poor as church mice.

A most characteristic feature of the West Cosst is that eveiybody and everything seem bbe waiting for Government to do something for them. There is no self help. No attempt to develop the enormous natural resocce* of the place. It is true that there are dScclties to be overcome, but what are they ctnjared to those of the early settlers ? All this immerse extent of bush land might surely be made more useful fVutn jt is. At pesest it i» nothing but a dense tangle of toot; td Ilianet (as they call them in South Amerk-a). and lawyers and ferns so dose and thick toot it is impossible to move a yard through The few people here who have teed to dear land ray it costs from £SO to £IOO an acre to clear. Perhaps it does in the wav they go about it, but if they were to ring the trees, cut down the scrub, and set nrc to it on some fine day (and we have b«d some beautiful weather lately), it might be cleared eo as to admit of grass seed being sown within a year for £2 an acre. The local bodies here are in that delightful state of brotherly love and Christian charity towards each other which so generally characterises local bodies in New Zealand. ngb ° f , fecent creation has just rej levied within its boonwhich are rather extensive, and it dofe* kee P A* in repair. Ole tomtvConned asfa that it shalleither reduties or keep the reads in -Ti F , OE3 Borough Council declines one “ the other. The Council thereupon wrote complaining of . the transactioroSl snd a-miv.* odgb Councillors thereupon moved letter 6eco . the motion, tlmt the “inppmt E ° t i^ lre^onaccounfco * the word I® J . b ® n ß»Pf J »e4 to the conduct of Forta aately, for the -TCht of the Borough, the Mayor interposed, enitvdistinction between ”inand “ iniquity.” h’eirT* 1 ?* j rnoE t extraordinary thing that Which boaßts ofbctogre&radSsv? d 60 much a . head of the Old Ehftilr^v m political and social, f tuaUy cr . eated » clasTof rioai'lLf. w ? re abolished by the Munim ? ng - iaild 80 fap Mck as ably tr f r omid at Home to bTfcreri-‘ th/ educate^ 3 °1 “option and jobbery; hstiSSS an , dres l» ct aWe part of the into the “ - d neTer condescend to belong Si,» pH*. «d who fomd Bho P kee P ers others wridffvrfT ovn ? i >wmiiar 7 interests funds. Thor* 1 manipulating the Borough Boyal rw y . w . ere > after doe enquiry by a thatwa?“T lan - abolished b» J? their noxiousness, Zealand anv ifoi °f Farl i?ment. Yet in New can create t^ t e , kDot, . of ® Te hundred people M »JorO>SS?i IM,lTe l. lnto a Brough, have a Clerk and all the for the “ fopod qmte unnecessary w »‘aimn| °, £ “h” l * of I*»don Unts - of of inhabiwith their Roughs in this Colony, Cu »a ! ice?lit e .^Jfl. ect ' ar ® “riy little «ome dav “ d mosquitoes, and °us!y liie, be abolished very unceremoniWe tho . ame riass of municipalities at